And Then There Were Three

OTM technical director Dylan Keefe arrived on Saturday to provide a much needed infusion of vitality and good cheer. These past few days have been LONG, fruitful and arduous with a capital R, leaving little time to conjure up thoughts (let alone leave them here).

Whatever moments we spent planning this show - mapping out the hour on our whiteboard back in NYC - were, like a teenage infatuation, both urgent and quickly undone. With every next interview, the tone and texture of our story has changed. And so we've taken to Post-it notes, scattered on our apartment wall like movable parts in a two-dimensional Erector Set. Wait. Did I mention that Dylan arrived?


He brought not only good cheer but great inspiration, courtesy of Delta Airlines (apparently he slept eight hours and had a flash during the other one). Before he landed, Brooke and I went back to the Moscow headquarters of Novaya Gazeta to talk with editor Sergei Sokolov, who is investigating the murder of his colleagues. He is a sober, heavy-hearted man, buoyed only by a reporter's faith in plodding truth. Plodding, grinding, sluggish truth.